The Cutest Shadows Ever

I was holding Jossy's hand as we walked home from church today when I noticed we had a cute little friend walking with us: her shadow. Is it just me, or do pigtails make for adorable shadows? So I got the camera and brought her and Matty back out to the driveway for some fun pictures.





I love taking pictures like this!!

(Kinda reminds me of this post from oh-so-long ago.)

A Joyous Day!

Dan and I had the wonderful priveledge on Saturday of going to the temple with his sister Liz as she received her endowment in the Idaho Falls temple. What an exciting day for his family! My beautiful sister-in-law is a single mother with 4 kids and was just GLOWING! We feel such joy to have been there as years of poor choices, heartache, and hard work culminated in this experience. I'm so thankful for the temple, for the Atonement, and for the love of a Savior that makes anything possible.

She had many family and friends there to support her.
(I'm slouching so that I don't block those around me.)

Liz with my in-laws

We were so grateful to be there. When we couldn't find anyone to take the kids during our overnight trip to Idaho, my mom (who's recovering from knee-replacement surgery) offered to watch them for us even though she wouldn't have my dad or anyone there to help her.
THANK YOU, MOM!!! You're the best!
And thank heavens they weren't holy terrors this time!!

Preschool Graduation

We had a little graduation ceremony at our house last week for Matty's preschool. I took turns with 4 other moms teaching our kids (though one had to drop out in the last few months.) It was definitely a challenge but rewarding as well. It's a relief to be done with it now! The whole graduation took a lot of work, but I felt like these kids (and us moms!) deserved to have a nice celebration after all the effort we've put into this year!

The frustrating thing about being the one to run the ceremony is I couldn't take pictures, too! Dan had come home from work to see Matty "graduate," so he took control of the camera. Unfortunately, I think he had Jossy in his arms at the same time so a lot of them ended up blurry. :(

The kids walked down the stairs as the graduation song played. (Couldn't believe I remembered I had that song in my CD collection because of some Music and Humanities course I took in college!)


They then sat in their chairs and got to recite some of the things we'd learned this year.


The class before graduation we spent making books about ourselves, so each child got to share that with everyone. They enjoyed their little moment in the spotlight. In their book was a page that said "When I grow up, I want to be . . ." The kids answers were "in kindergarten," "a daddy," "a princess like Cinderella," and a "paleontologist." Yep, my son watches too much Dinosaur Train. lol


After the kids gave a cookie they decorated to their mom to say thank you, I handed everyone their diploma and a balloon.



We enjoyed a few treats afterwards. Here's Matty and his future wife. Oops! . . . I mean his best friend. ;)

Lamb and Wool Festival

We went to this at Thanksgiving Point a couple weeks ago. Matty was feeling super sick that day (turned out to be double ear infections) but he toughed things out the best he could.

We got to watch a sheep being sheared, pet animals, make a wool bracelet, watch a sheep dog demo, and more.

Anyone else notice how after you have kids, watching their faces is a lot more enjoyable than seeing whatever it is you've gone to see? I always find myself watching them way more than whatever I'm supposed to be looking at. :)

Here's just a few quick pictures from the day:

Watching a sheep dog herd some sheep out in the field.

Some silly faces while we wait for Matty's pony ride

Seeing him on this pony and thinking about the first time he rode one here just makes me realize how fast he's growing up. *sigh*

My Sweet Nieces

I took some pictures of these beautiful sisters a couple weeks ago and have been dying to share them. Anyone who knows me well probably has heard me talk about Emi, my six-year-old niece with special needs. I was so impressed with how well Emi listened during our session and how she showed off her natural posing skills. That girl definitely has her momma's genes! :)

Go check out more pictures at my photography blog if you can! Like I said, I've been super excited to share these ones! Maybe it's the proud aunt in me. :)

And another little bit of news, a picture I took is going to be used for a medical profile about Lone Peak Dental and published in Utah Valley Magazine in the July/August issue. I'm waiting to show the picture here until it comes out, but I'm really excited about the opportunity and wanted to share the news!

Too Much Too Young

On my way out the door the other night, I heard Dan telling Jossy, "Go show Mommy." I waited for Jossy to walk around the corner and saw this:


NICE!! My colorstay lipstick all over her (and her binky.) Guess she's learned how to unscrew the cap.

Since I was in a hurry, I left cleanup duty to Dan. When I got home, I asked if everything came off alright. "No," he said. I thought he was kidding, but it turns out he wasn't. This was her the next morning.


This picture doesn't do justice to how much was still left on her face. There's a ton you can't see on her right cheek.

I thought maybe Daddy just didn't scrub hard enough. I got out some soap and a rag and went to town. Poor little girl, all that scrubbing made no difference. I had thoughts flashing before me of a little clown in tow for the next few weeks as it slowly wore itself off. I thought of how I'd explain her red face at church the next day.

Luckily, I didn't have to worry much longer.


Turns out baby oil takes it right off.

I sure love Google.

Let's Call It "Self Art"

What Every Grandma Wants

As Mother's Day approached this year, I racked my brain trying to come up with something nice but not too expensive to give my mom. A couple days before the big day, I remembered that she'd been asking for a new picture of the kids for quite some time to go in the frame they gave her a while back. Her old picture was from when Jossy was just 6 months old!

I thought, "Great! We'll just hop over to the local park and take a few good pictures for Grandma!" Not so easy. Rule #1 of photography: More than likely, you're own kids will always be your toughest clients. I've always known this, but it's so easy to forget!

After a quick haircut for Matty, our best attempt at finding semi-matching clothes, and gathering up my equipment we were off by 9:30. We made it through the initial tears and whining, and with the help of a little bribery (no shame in that!) we got a few good pictures for Grandma to choose from for her frame.

Here are a few of my favorites:





Not only did Grandma get a new picture to display in her house, but I got the side benefit of having some as well. :)

Helga

A couple weeks ago (I'm way behind on blogging obviously) my sister Ardice was watching my kids for me. When I went to pick them up, I saw that she had done Jossy's hair super cute. I learned that Jossy actually ASKED to have her hair done, something she never lets me do! I loved it and had to take a picture when we got home, assuming it would never happen again.



The next morning was church and surprisingly Jossy wanted her pretty bows back in her hair. I was amazed she actually sat semi-still for it! (I was equally amazed I did an okay job recreating it!)


Getting a good look at her, I told Dan with her blond hair, blue eyes, and this hairstyle, maybe we should change her name to Helga.

Here's Helga after church:


Beauty never lasts long.

Two Peas in a Pod

Matty and Jossy have their terrible, awful moments together. But they also have such wonderful times full of laughter when they get along great. Here's a common scene of them watching a movie together. Yes, we have other sitting/laying options in the room, but sometimes they just want to be together.


Tonight was one of those good times. They couldn't stop laughing and running around the living room together, wrestling, dancing, laughing, and having a blast. The fun didn't stop as I got them ready for bed. They had so much fun together tonight that Jossy did NOT want to leave Matty's bed where they were playing and Matty did NOT want her to go. He kept begging that she stay in his room and that we get bunk beds. I eventually managed to convince her to go to her room for bedtime, but Matty was not so happy to let go. As I took her from the room, he started earnestly BAWLING his eyes out for his sister! :( It was the saddest, sweetest thing!

If only it were this sweet all the time. :)

Since I don't know where else to put these, here are a couple random pictures from tonight. Matty took this first one of Jossy and I cuddling on the couch.


And here's my silly boy with one of his many funny faces.

They may drive me crazy, but I sure love these kids!!

Romance Is. . .

. . . my husband picking lilacs for me on his way home from work because he knows how much I love them. :)


Sure, maybe I mentioned the other day how one time in the first year of our marriage he had gone out early in the morning and found someone to ask if he could have some lilacs growing in their yard, brought them back and put them in a vase before I woke up so I could eat breakfast with lilacs on the table. Maybe I said how much I loved that sweet little surprise and still remember it. Doesn't matter that I brought it up. He brought me spontaneous, free flowers that I love. I'm happy. :)

The Family Nudist

Jossy gets put to bed around 7:30, but she doesn't usually fall asleep until around 9:00. She typically plays pretty happily in her bed or talks or sings until she falls asleep. Sometimes she yell at us for something to drink and we'll give her some water and lay her back down. Tonight she was trying to talk to us, but it only lasted about 2 minutes and she gave up, so I figured it was no big deal and she had gone to sleep.

Around 10:30 PM I went to shut her bedroom door and thought maybe I'd just quickly peak in on her, something I rarely do because she's a super light sleeper like her mommy. I looked at her and had to run from the room laughing to get Dan and the camera.




She had unzipped her pajamas, stripped off her diaper, and peed a little here and there. Given that she's laying on the diaper, I really think she tried to put it back on herself. That's most likely what she was hollering to us about.

Do you know how torturous it is to wake up a perfectly asleep child?! I didn't feel like she left me much of a choice. The flash from my camera woke her up, we put a new diaper on her, dressed her back in her pajamas, took away everything pee soaked (to which she cried) and rocked her for a minute. She quickly went back to sleep.

I did find her once about 2 months ago completely stripped down in the morning when I went to get her up for the day, but she had just done it, not slept all night like that. I thought it was a one time thing. Guess not.

The Story of Our $360 Toy Cars

We've had some issues with the kids' upstairs bathroom since we moved into this house. Just little things like running the faucet would make the toilet bubble, and flushing the toilet would make the tub gurgle. Nothing ever really came up (except the toilet backing up maybe 5 times total) so we just lived with our haunted bathroom. A few weeks ago we noticed that when running the garbage disposal in the kitchen, the toilet upstairs would gurgle. Hmmmm. Weird.

Then last Thursday the kitchen sink got clogged in the morning. It was still draining but VERY slowly (like if it was completely full, it would take nearly 30 minutes to drain.) It seemed to resolve itself for a while, but happened again in the afternoon. I stopped trying to do dishes and ran to the store for some draino. I poured it down the sink just before giving the kids their bath. I checked on it a bit later and poured more draino in it since nothing had changed. I went back upstairs and drained the tub. It was probably another 20-30 minutes before I went back down to try and flush hot water on the draino like I'm supposed to, but when I walked in the kitchen it hit me that something wasn't right. Yep, the bathtub water had overflowed all over my kitchen.

This picture doesn't even BEGIN to show the mess we had to deal with. I took it after cleaning up a ton.


It overflowed the sink, flooded both counters, went in every drawer and cupboard it could, got my microwave cart and everything on it, and was all over my nice wood floor. I felt lucky that at least my phone wasn't on the counter (which it almost always is) and there weren't any checks laying around there that needed cashing. We grabbed every towel we could find and started mopping up. Because I had just poured a ton of draino down the sink, everything smelled like bleach and had that nasty chemical on it. It completely ruined a few things. The next morning, we were still finding water and more damage. We called our warranty company and had them send out a plumber . . . who took 4 days to get to us.

They tried snaking the drain, but got caught on something very hard. He got out the camera and found this:


A nice wad of white. He suspected it was stuck on something. He located where in the pipes the camera was at and found it down in our basement bedroom in a corner. He called our warranty company to get approval for the repairs. They said they'd pay for it as long as it wasn't a foreign object (like a toy) stuck in there. Otherwise, it's on our dime.

So the plumber cut a nice hole in our drywall to get to the pipes and discovered there was (luckily) a clean-out right there! The previous owners had covered it when finishing the basement themselves. (We'll be putting a vent return cover there so that we can have access in the future . . . but praying we never need it again.) So he opened the plug, and after getting our barrings from the horrible smell, he used his shop vac to unclog things. We heard a loud THUMP in the vac, so we knew something had been sucked up. But he said there was still something wedged really tightly in the pipe. He pulled out this:

(I'm leaving these images small so no one has to see too much sewage detail.)

On the one hand, we were bummed that this meant we had to pay for things. But we were happy that the problem was fixed, and even more happy when he told us we're lucky it didn't go any further down the pipe or we would have had to break up the foundation to get to it. (PRICEY and a MESS!) I was surprised I wasn't more upset about having to pay for things, but I guess the Lord blessed me that day with a jovial heart. Dan and I felt like if we had to pay all this money for the repairs, we might as well find humor in it and get some entertainment value out of that $360! :)


The plumber took his shop vac outside, opened it to see what had made the thump sound, and found another little friend.


No, neither of these belong to us. And yes, I'm 100% positive. So why are we keeping them in a baggy you ask? We know the family who rented this house before us and we just thought it might be funny to see if they recognize them. :)

So there you have it, my $360 cars. Not a great deal, but it could have been so much worse and I'm just happy it wasn't!

Jossy and Her Baby

Jossy absolutely LOVES her baby cousin Liv. My sister Ardice was watching Jossy one day for me, and she let her help feed Liv her bottle. Jossy was in heaven! Ardice snapped some pictures and sent them to me.


Today Liv was over at our house and once again Jossy demanded to help give her the bottle. I love how big Liv is on Jossy's lap and her feet sticking out here.


These two are going to be great friends!